


Mister Ten Below

by FifteenDozenTimes



Category: Beyond Belief - Fandom, The Thrilling Adventure Hour
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-26
Packaged: 2018-05-09 13:17:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5541419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FifteenDozenTimes/pseuds/FifteenDozenTimes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An odd visitor interrupts the Doyle’s Christmas with the Hendersons.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mister Ten Below

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Readerofmuch](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Readerofmuch/gifts).



> For the Thrilling Adventure Hour secret santa.
> 
> Thanks as always to epershand for beta-ing and inspiration.

It’s unseasonably warm, sun so bright most days Donna doesn’t want to leave the house during the day even with her gloves and umbrella. It’s put Dave in a foul mood, which is rare enough the rest of the year, but absolutely baffling around Christmas. No assortment of festive hats or sweaters, no glittering fanny pack to lend an air of holiday cheer to his allergy, no decorations so thickly layered on every surface there’s nowhere to put a glass down. At least he got a tree, when Donna reminded him it was Michelle’s first Christmas and they should go through some of the motions, but she’d never seen someone decorate so unhappily.

Donna hadn’t realized how accustomed she’d become to the slow crush of tinsel and greenery and Dave’s deep voice booming Christmas carols nearly nonstop for two months until it went away.

Maybe Frank and Sadie will be feeling properly festive, brighten up the house a little bit. They usually do.

Right then, almost like they can read her mind - Sadie probably can, Donna’s never been able to prove otherwise - the doorbell rings and she can hear Frank complaining about leaving the house. Dave, even slump-shouldered and slow-moving as he is this morning, beats her to the door.

“Merry Christmas!” they holler, loud enough to raise the dead, and the baby, and there’s a flurry of activity as they pour inside, followed by the liquor delivery boy they’ve gotten to cart two large coolers behind them, and the other liquor delivery boy rolling a fully stocked bar cart. 

“We have drinks,” Donna says, but she’s not sure anyone hears her over the chaos of bottles clinking, Sadie singing, Frank cheerfully ordering the delivery boys around, and the baby crying. No one makes an entrance quite like the Doyles.

Their customary gifts of rare blood and interesting meats make it to the fridge, drinks are mixed, Dave fetches Michelle and cradles her in the crook of his big elbow so she stops crying, the delivery boys leave, and all is quiet again in the Henderson home.

“Dave, darling, I’ve come to expect a bit more festivity from you.”

“I find it difficult to be festive in shorts.”

“It’s difficult to be anything in shorts, my good man.”

Before Dave can respond, there’s a knock on the door. 

“Oh, I’ll get it,” Sadie says, leaps up and glides to the door.

“Another gift?” Donna asks.

“Your guess is as good as mine.”

“Donna! Do you know a blue-skinned white-haired gentleman? He claims to be an air conditioner repairman but that’s clearly not true. Also, it appears to be snowing, but only upon him! Which would make him a crackerjack air conditioner repairman, were he actually one.”

Dave’s ears perk up, not entirely unlike his reaction when he’s in wolf form and Donna offers him belly rubs. 

“Perhaps he’s some sort of cosmic repairman, Sadie love? Here to fix the weather? We’ve seen stupider.”

“Is that what you’re here for?”

“Sort of,” says the strange voice from the doorway. “I’m here for the baby.”

*

Even with Frank and Dave here, it’s like the old days, Sadie and Donna on the couch across from some miserable supernatural something-or-other who won’t shut up about his or her emotional problems. At least in those days they did this on purpose, and not with the threat of an attempted kidnapping over their heads. Not that it’s much of a threat, especially not with Frank and Sadie here, but it’s still hard to grasp why she should care about this guy’s problems.

“It’s always been that way! Mother is cold and distant, my brother and I bicker, everything stays more or less in balance. But all of a sudden he’s so _nice_ to her, tricking her into loving him more, and so she doesn’t step in when he messes up my stuff!”

“I’m not sure being nice to someone counts as a trick,” Frank says.

“It is when he does it!” shouts the stranger (he never gave his name; he refused to do it without singing, and Frank refused to let him sing), little flurries of snow swirling around his hands as he flaps them wildly.

“So, um, where exactly does my baby come in?”

“If I give Mother her first grandchild, she’ll love me best, of course.”

“There are easier ways to get a baby, darling,” Sadie says.

“Not with this personality.”

“Can’t argue with you there,” Frank says. “But you could adopt, probably.”

“All that red tape! Besides, I need to be certain it could survive in my ice palace, and an immortal apocalypse baby won’t have any trouble with that.”

“We don’t yet know that she’s an apocalypse baby,” Dave points out.

“Or that she’s immortal, for that matter.”

“Only one way to find out!”

“Well, that’s enough of this,” Frank says, and stands up. “Donna, where do you keep the flamethrower?”

“Now, Frank, there’s no need for that. Mister Selfish and Frosty, has it occurred to you to simply be even nicer to your mother? Surely if you and your brother were both nice to her, it would have the same result as whatever you were doing before? Take her to a nice lunch or something, for goodness sake.”

“I...hm. I never thought of that.”

“Well, why would you? It’s only the obvious solution that doesn’t involve committing a felony.”

The frozen stranger ignores Frank and gives Sadie what must be a very uncomfortable handshake, then swoops out the door leaving a trail of rapidly-melting ice behind him.

*

The day passes like all Christmases pass, with liquor and singing and laughing. Dave unwraps the package neatly labeled _To Michelle, from Auntie & Uncle Doyle_ to find gin truffles inside, and it takes perhaps longer than it should to explain why Michelle can’t actually have those. There’s a small knife with an intricately carved handle as well, and Donna never does quite manage to convince them it’s inappropriate. 

Dave gets chilly and changes from shorts to jeans, then puts on one of his bulky Christmas sweaters, then a hat, then finally turns the heat on. It happens so gradually Donna doesn’t really think about what it means, not until she glances out the window and there’s a soft dusting of snow on the ground.

“Well,” Sadie says, when Donna points it out, “good for him.”

“Better for us,” Frank says, and three glasses and a beer bottle clink against each other in agreement.


End file.
